Bus station critic may have to open it

A stern critic of Bath's new bus station may have to officially declare it open.

Cllr Bryan Chalker was one of the most vociferous opponents of the bus station plans and campaigned in vain to save Churchill House, the building it will replace.

But ironically it could fall to the politician to declare the city's new £13 million transport hub officially open at a ceremony in June.

By that time Cllr Chalker will be chairman of Bath and North East Somerset Council and it is inconceivable that he will not be invited to the opening of the complex which includes the controversial "busometer" and is on the site of Churchill House.

The council, which has worked with developer Multi on the scheme as part of the £360 million SouthGate centre, says it has not yet been approached by transport group First with a request to provide someone to cut the ribbon, and the bus firm said it was still finalising plans.

But Cllr Chalker, who helped set up the Bath Heritage Watchog pressure group after the failure of the campaign to save Churchill House, is expecting he may be asked to do the honours.

The bus station rotunda, which has been dubbed the busometer and likened to a baked bean can by critics, will house an information desk, ticket office, toilets, café, staff facilities and locker room.

Conservative Cllr Chalker said he was unable to comment in detail because of his forthcoming non-political role.

But he said: "It is not my favourite piece of architecture. It is a bit of an embarrassment really because one or two people have said to me 'You were right all along.'"

Cllr Chalker was a key figure in the Save Churchill House campaign, which saw hundreds of people take to the streets of Bath to hold a mock funeral for the art deco building.

He also recorded a song, Little Boxes, which made reference to the planned demolition, and argued that Churchill House's façade could be used in the design of the new station.

In a letter to the Chronicle in 2007, he wrote: "The SouthGate tower is squat and repulsive and an affront to everything this proud old city stands for. This dreadful concrete, steel, glass and spaghetti ring rotunda wouldn't even rate as landfill when it comes to replacing a building designed and erected as a 'temple to electricity' and described by the Twentieth Century Society as 'one of Bath's key buildings.

"Yes, I refer to Churchill House. Messrs Multi Development and Bath's planners/executives must have taken leave of their senses if they thought we'd sit back and make way for this Eastern-bloc horror from the grim 60s."

Despite the mock funeral, Churchill House was demolished two months later.

The bus station will form part of the new transport interchange, which will also see a £6.5m revamp of Bath Spa railway station.

The rest of the bus station is being built on land used by Western Power Distribution and which is home to the hub of a large section of Bath's electrical services.

A new switch room was built for the power firm earlier this year in preparation for demolition work to make way for the concourse of the new bus station, which will start to take shape when steelwork arrives later this month.

The concourse will see a glass screen running along Dorchester Street, with seating for passengers.

Canopies will provide shelter outside the concourse.

Multi is now in talks with First to come up with an opening date, but the development firm said that an official ceremony would take place.

Comments

Strange how all this discussion is going on, yet to my knowledge the question of there still being an unexploded 1000 pound German bomb under the site has yet to be officially denied or confirmed.
As I understand it, Multi were officially advised to proceed with extreme caution, especially within 20 metres or so of the old Churchill House entrance.
Evidently the unexploded bomb situation was reported prior to construction, mainly from witnesses at the time it dropped in 1942.
So does anyone out there know the outcome, or are we to shop at the Southgate Centre with extreme caution?

"Whatever you think of the new building, surely the point that a wonderful building called Churchill House has been lost forever."
Vernon Herridge, Bay Tree Road

Well, that's somewhat subjective, isn't it? I personally thought Churchill House was an horrendously crude piece of architecture. And let's not forget why it was there in the first place - local government officials forcing the demolition of a pub that had been on the site for 200 years.Somehow I can imagine the people protesting against the demolition of Churchill House would have been the very same people protesting about it being built in the first place!

Councillor Chalker has proven over the years that he has been representing Larkhall to be a man of his word. Having lead and lost the battle over Churchill House he will no doubt be magnanimous in defeat, and pragmatic enough to realise it's no use crying over spilt miilk.
So give it your blessing Brian. Then clear out the corridors of BANES of all those stale old fogies determined to keep the city in the eighteenth century, and those who allow us to be saddled with non-sensical planning decisions.

Hello, wake up! It looks worse than the artists impression! However wonderful you think it looks, bus fares won't go down, the buses will never run on time, and once the Southgate shopping centre opens the congestion down there will get worse when he car park with 860 parking spaces opens.
Even if the BRT goes ahead, why are they opening a 860 space car park in the centre of Bath?
And as for the integrated bus ticket that they annonced last week that can be be used on all of the bus companies that operate in Bath - Worst Bus operate the majority of bus routes in Bath, apart from the limited services operated by Faresaver and the new service that Wessex bus (or whatever they are called) are going to operate.

I think the bus station looks fabulous - much better than that dreadful mock Georgian pastiche opposite. I know which one will look better in 50 years time and it won't be the fake Baths stone one. Mind you its all going to be under water by then anyway......

As 'OK' as the new bus station looks, I much prefer the building that was there prior... A clever re-working of that building would have looked amazing and been in-keeping with the mock Georgian Southgate project over the road¿